


Season's Turn

by PartyLines, zoomzoomzuppa



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Christmas Drabbles, F/M, Harmony & Co Advent Collection, Post-War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-03
Updated: 2018-12-02
Packaged: 2019-09-06 01:21:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16822300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PartyLines/pseuds/PartyLines, https://archiveofourown.org/users/zoomzoomzuppa/pseuds/zoomzoomzuppa
Summary: Christmas brings peace to all.Written for Harmony & Co's Christmas Advent.





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

> Myself and the wonderful **zoomzoomzuppa** thought this would be a great time to play around with some proper drabble writing. Here's our story in a few words. Beta work done by each other. Merry Christmas!

There was snow on the ground and a chill had replaced her bones. She sat on a chair at the back of her home shivering time away, only her shallow breathing for company. Time was nothing but a fickle fade in and fade out of the sun as it rose and set. She was not present.

The hum of Christmas music reached her, at some point or another, but she ignored it. Her door chime woke her from a stupor. There sat a portkey in a box - with a note.

_Come if you want. Happy Christmas._

“Harry.”

She smiled.


	2. Two

Red-gold heat lit the hearth but did little to melt the chill of winter he carried in with him. A quiet struck him when he saw Kreacher's festive tree, much louder than the always-there electric hiss of accolades and “I'm-so-sorrys” that wouldn't go away; reminded him of too much.

The clock struck away seconds and he thought she probably wouldn't come - he'd been asking too much. The wine was Christmas on his tongue, but it felt _wrong_ : thick and viscous and bloody-red. He almost dropped it when the whirring came.

“Hermione,” he breathed.

She nodded, looking at the floor.


	3. Three

It was dark and cold when the fire burned low and the wine ran out, but she was warmed from inside by the light in his eyes. His gaze leant her the life hers had drained from her and she could almost breathe again.

“It'll be okay,” he told her, his gentle hands pressing her limbs into hard floorboards almost enough to make her believe it - even though he didn't.

“Mmmhmm,” she murmured. “So they tell us.”

“He wouldn't mind, you know.” There was promise in his voice now.

“I know,” she nodded, because she did.

_Almost, almost, almost_


	4. Four

The year before, they'd been together in a graveyard, mourning loved ones; running for their lives and wishing Ron was with them. 

It felt the same except now the monsters were within themselves: the ghosts; the vestiges of war. 

“Do you think he'll come back?” She asked.

Harry's hand stilled, and his voice cracked; torn. “Yes, Hermione. He'll come back.”

She was caged between his rapid heartbeat and suffocating ( _protecting_ ) arms. “How do you know?”

It was now Harry the wise; now Hermione the lost. Some things _had_ changed - on the surface.

“Always has before.”

Hopefully others never would.


	5. Five

Harry let go and rolled away from her and his bitter, biting guilt before it could bleed onto her dress and into the open.

She swallowed.

_Was it her pain or his? Did it taste like Weasley-red and freckles?_

“Hermione?”

She pulled him back and there was nothing bitter about her breath on his collarbone or her careful fingers against his cheek.

“Shhh,” she murmured. “He’s had long enough, we need him - something’s _missing_ \- but he's really never been you. I just…”

He closed his eyes and this time when he imagined Ron returning, he grinned.

“Er… right.”


	6. Six

Starved hands learned sweat-slick skin and winter melted into revival beneath worn-out fingerprints. Hermione gasped as her dress bunched up around her waist – knickers catching on her ankle – and Harry caught her pain in his lungs as he breathed her in. He bunched her wild, untied hair behind her head and she felt the cool of freedom she hadn’t known in years.

“Okay?” he murmured into the dip behind her ear.

“ _Alive_ ,” she hissed, working at his trousers and the last blockade between war and peace. “I feel _alive_ again.”

He reached to graze her jaw and they found _home_.


	7. Seven

Rich sunrise refracting off ice flickered through cracked windows, and Christmas dawned brighter than Hermione remembered; _warmer._ The arm across her felt light instead of caging, but the doorbell _kept chiming._

Harry woke as she slipped from his heat and slipped on her dress.

“Where you going?” he huffed as he reached for his pants.

“Someone’s at the door.” She fought the urge to roll her eyes as the bell chimed again.

“The door?” Harry asked. “But –.”

She grinned, and they barreled down the hall – hands clasped.

When the door opened, the world righted itself.

“Ron!”

_All was well._


End file.
